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The Son of Clemenceau written by Alexandre (fils) Dumas

A >> Alexandre (fils) Dumas >> The Son of Clemenceau




"Are you able to keep a secret?" she asked with gravity.

"I think so."

They had withdrawn into the window recess, and could see the gardens, as
they conversed. The light fell on her through the Valenciennes curtain
and at her back was a sombre tapestry. Her late trial gave her an
exhausted air which seemed the additional gloss with which melancholy
makes a woman more fascinating in the sentimental eyes of youth.

"I dare say you can keep your own," she pointedly said.

"Not so well, I fear, as another's."

"You must give me your word of honor that if my plot does not please
you, nobody shall be told?"

"I give you my promise," he said freely, just as he would have given her
anything she asked for.

He had debated with his passion, uttered every reason of others and all
he could devise, overwhelmed himself with good advice and created a
Chinese Wall of obstacles, but he heard himself murmuring: "I love her!"
The only way, he feared, to put an end to his wicked craze was to put an
end to his life--an irreputable argument, but to be used moderately. She
allowed him to quiver under her lingering gaze, and finally said:

"The fact is, I do not like the idea of M. Clemenceau selling this
house. It would be a greater grief than he believes now. He has his
dearest memories springing here. Besides, he could not work in peace in
town. Fortunately, my uncle has provided me with the means to help him.
I want to lend him the sum required, but I fear that he would accept
nothing from me."

"He is a very proud man," observed the Italian, courteously, for, while
he worshiped the speaker, he knew that she was not morally without
blemishes.

Not because her affection for him was a proof of that delinquency, for
love overlooked that and gave it another name, but because he believed
Clemenceau, and the woman, while no less alluring, was terrifying as
well.

"It is an excess of very cruel justice!" said she with a strange warmth.
"The greatest punishment on a wrongdoer is to refuse her, when
repentant, the joy of doing a kindness. You need not pretend surprise,
for I have done harm. I did not forsee what would be thought of my hasty
conduct, and even if I were wicked; can you expect a woman to have the
loftiness of genius like him, and the force for resisting temptation
like you?"

"Like me!" ejaculated Antonino, starting.

"Yes; can you deny that you have had to wrestle and are wrestling now
with yourself most strenuously?"

He averted his eyes and made no reply.

"Child that you are," she resumed. "You were right when you just now
said that you could keep the secret of others better than your own. Can
the eyes of an honest youth like you deceive those of a wayward woman
like me? I thank you for the effort you have made--and the silence your
lips have preserved. It matters not. I am glad that after doing the act
of reparation proposed, I shall have the means to go away, literally,
for good this time. It is time I went."

He lifted his hand as if to detain her, but let it fall quickly.

After all, if she departed forever without speaking out the secret of
those two hearts, what harm would be done. Who had the right to prevent
the susceptible Italian feeling the first impressions of the gentler sex
and owing them to Cesarine? He could but be thankful that he saw only
the prologue to "the great dreadful tragedy of Woman." He might blame
himself for cherishing the memory of the false wife, but he could not
annul that early sensation. Was it her fault, brought to France at the
sequel of a romantic adventure, if she met him, a castaway, and
disturbed his youth and innocence? There had not seemed any evil
intention in speech or behavior toward him, and he himself might be as
proud as she was of the pure and respectful sentiment which should have
contributed toward her amelioration. In this case, he--ignorant of the
counter-attraction of the Viscount de Terremonde--imagined that she had
struggled also against the pressure of nature and the sin was no more
when she triumphed.

"Well, listen to the secret which we can discuss," said she. "I wish to
be associated with you in a good action, which, I hope, will lead to
many another, if it is the first. One of these days, when you learn the
story of my life, you will see there was a little good in it to shine on
the dark background. Are you not willing to help me increase it? In this
case, that good and honorable man will profit."

Antonino listened spellbound, he could have been ordered up to their own
terrible cannon's mouth by that resistless voice.

"Let me live one day in your youth, illusions and unstained conscience,"
she implored. "Well, here in this little pocketbook are letters of
credit for two hundred thousand francs. It is all I have--take it."

"What am I to do with it?" said Antonino.

"Put it away somewhere out of my reach to retake it. I know myself and
that, if I have a good thought one day, I might entertain the reverse on
the next. If I broke into the money, I could not replace the sum
extracted, and, another thing, I cannot make the use of it I intended.
Leave me to win from my husband the acceptance of the help I wish to
give him. It may take long, but until then, pray keep the money; that
will not entangle you in any degree."

What a strange woman! he thought. She does evil with the easy, graceful
air of an almsgiver distributing charity, and she does good with the
stealth of a criminal!

"I am a fair example of my sex," said she, divining what was in his
mind, "weak, ignorant, unfortunate: and stupid--and the proof is any
harm I have done to others is nothing to that I have wrought to myself."

Antonino, taking the pocketbook--a dainty article in Russian
leather--went to the oaken chest which he opened after what seemed some
cabalistic manipulation, and the muttering of what seemed an "Open
Sesame!"

"Have you no safe yet, is that box strong and secure?" she inquired in a
tone of well assumed anxiety, as she hurriedly took three or four steps
to bring her again beside him.

"You need not be alarmed. That is a box of which we made the peculiar
fastenings. It is too heavy to be carried off, and burglars will not
tamper with it in impunity," said the Italian, smiling maliciously, as
he put his hand on the lid to raise it.

"I understand; it opens with a secret lock?"

"Yes; one I cannot tell you about."

"I have no use for it," she said hastily, "on the contrary, I wish the
money to be where I cannot touch it."

"Nobody will touch it there," returned the young man gravely. "Stop! how
will you get it if anything happens to me--if I should die?"

"A young man like you die in a couple of days!" laughed Cesarine.

"It may occur," he replied gloomily. "Death has hovered over this house
at any moment of some of our experiments with the most powerful essences
of nature. And only this morning, when I was out to the post-office,
they were talking of a hideous discovery--a young man's remains, found
in a ditch in the Five Hectare Field."

"A--a young man?"

"A foreigner, some said; but his clothes were in tatters, and the
water-rats had disfigured him."

"Poor fellow!" said she, and quickly she added as if eager to change the
subject: "my name is on the letters of credit. In case of any mishap, I
will plainly say so to my husband and he will return me my own
property."

That was sensible. He had no farther remonstrances to offer, and taking
advantage of her glancing out into the garden, he closed the lid and
fastened it so that she could not see how the trick was done. She was
not vexed, for she saw that man is always weak and on the point of
losing his Paradise. Antonino would betray as the price of love. She
allowed him to go in to luncheon alone, wishing to inspect the
mysterious casket; but, unluckily, she was interrupted by Hedwig, who
rather officiously wanted to dust the room. Not for the first time,
Cesarine, remembering the wide occult sway claimed by Colonel Von
Sendlingen, suspected that the girl was not so much her ally as she
wished. She had begun to watch her under the impression that she was in
confederacy with Mademoiselle Daniels. She had perceived no signs of
that, but she believed she intercepted an exchange of glances with the
false Marseillais. They were of the same nationality and this fact
caused Cesarine to be on her guard. Unless Hedwig repeated what had
happened between Clemenceau and Antonino, how could the colonel know of
their conversation?

Hesitating to question her directly, disliking her from that moment, and
feeling her heart shrink at her loneliness when such crushing odds were
threatening her, she donned her "company smile" and went to the
sitting-room bravely.




CHAPTER XIX.

THE COMPACT.


Luncheon was served and M. Cantagnac, seated comfortably, was trying the
delicacies with rare conscientiousness about any escaping his
harpoon-like fork. Cesarine did not give him a second look and neither
he nor Clemenceau, with whom he was chatting on politics, more than
glanced up at her. M. Daniels was more polite, for he warmly accepted a
second cup of coffee as soon as she, without any attempt to displace
Mademoiselle Daniels at the urn, took her place beside her.

"Pray go on and attend to the liquors," she said kindly. "I am so
nervous that I am afraid I shall break something."

She took a seat which placed her on the left of the old Jew. A little
familiarity was only in keeping when two theatrical artists met.

"What is the matter with your daughter? she seems sad," she remarked
with apparent interest.

"That is natural enough when we are going away from France, it may be
forever."

"Going away from here?" inquired Madame Clemenceau.

"Yes; this evening, but we did not like to go without bidding you
good-bye. Now that we have seen you in good health, and thanked you for
your hospitality, we can proceed on our mission without compunction."

"A mission--where?"

"I have succeeded in interesting capitalists in your husband's
inventions. That is settled; and I have taken up again a holy
undertaking which should hardly have been laid aside for a mere money
matter. But there is nothing more sacred, after all, than friendship, I
owe to your husband more than I have thus far repaid," and he bent a
tender regard on his daughter, with its overflow upon Clemenceau one of
gratitude.

"Are you going far?" asked Cesarine, keeping her eyes in play but little
rewarded by her scrutiny of the sham Marseillais who devoured, like an
old campaigner, never sure of the next meal, or of Rebecca who
superintended the table in her stead with a serious unconcern.

"Around the world," replied Daniels simply, "straight on to the East."

"Goodness! it is folly to take a young lady with you. Is it a scientific
errand? No, you said holy. Religious?"

"Scientific of an exalted type."

"Is science somewhat entertaining for young ladies?"

"Some think it so."

"She might not. Leave her with me. We are comrades of art, you know,"
smiling up cordially at Rebecca, as if they had been friends of
childhood and had never parted any more than Venus' coupled loves.

"Where?"

"In our house," Cesarine replied, as though she were fully assured that
the smiling man on the opposite side of the board would not obtain the
property. "I do not think we shall quit it."

"If she likes," answered Daniels, easily.

"Rebecca!" he gently called, "Madame invites you to stay with her during
my journey. M. Clemenceau is my dearest friend, and from the time of his
wife consenting, do not constrain yourself into going if you would
rather remain."

"I thank you, madame," replied the Jewess, "but I am going with my
father, because we have never quitted one another, and I do not wish to
leave him alone."

"Dear child!" exclaimed Daniels embracing her before he let her return
to the head of the table. "She will not listen to any suggestion of
marriage. I know of a bright young gentleman who adores her--an
Israelite like us, in a promising position. He will one day be a
professor at the Natural History Museum. But she would not hear of him."

"It is not very amusing to live among birds, beasts and reptiles," said
Cesarine.

"Ha, ha! but then those are stuffed," exclaimed her opposite neighbor,
showing that he was listening.

"Very likely, she cherishes some little fancy in her heart," said Madame
Clemenceau, thinking of both her husband and Antonino.

"Possibly," said the Jew, complacently, for he knew that his daughter
was very fair.

"I believe I know the object," continued Madame Clemenceau.

"I am rather astonished that she should have told you, and not me."

"Oh, she has not told me anything, I guessed."

Daniels seemed relieved.

"And if you should like to hear the name," she began rapidly, but he
stopped her with a dignified smile. "What, you do not want to know what
I have found before you, and so much concerns you!"

"If she has not told me, it is because she does not want me to know," he
observed placidly.

"But what if she tells him!" persisted Cesarine.

"She would not let her lover know the state of her heart without
informing her father; she would commence with me."

The wife smiled cynically at such unlimited trust and felt her hatred of
Rebecca augment.

"There are not many fathers like you!"

"Nor many daughters like her," he retorted proudly. "I am of the opinion
that there is a mistake in the French mode of educating girls. The truth
about everything should be told them, as is done to their brothers. The
ignorance in which they are left often arises from their parents
themselves not knowing the causes and end of things, or have no time, or
have lost the right to speak of everything to their children from their
own errors or passions. My wife was the best of women and I believe
Rebecca takes after her. When she was of the age of comprehension, I
began to explain the world to her simply and clearly. All of heaven's
work is noble; no human soul--even a virgin's--has the right to be
shocked by any feature of it. Rebecca aided me when I sought to make a
livelihood by the profession of music, to which she had strong
proclivities."

Clemenceau was listening in courtesy to this argument, and the false
Marseillais did not lose a word--or a sip of his Kirschwasser.

"Afterward, when my ideas changed, and I could make my way to fortune by
a thoroughfare, less under the public eye, I associated her in my
studies. She knows," proceeded Daniels, who had shaken off a spell of
taciturnity which the stranger and Madame Clemenceau had inspired, and
seemed unable to pause, "she knows that nothing can be destroyed, and
that all undergoes transformation, and cannot cease to exists with the
exception of evil which diminishes as it goes on its way."

Cantagnac slowly absorbed another glass of the cherry cordial, which he
had to pour out himself as Rebecca had retired to a corner where the
host turned over the leaves of photographic album as a cover to their
dialogue.

"If my daughter loves," continued Daniels, seeing at last that his theme
was too abstruse for his single auditor, "as you conjectured, dear
madame, it is surely some honorable person worthy of that love; if she
has not informed me it is because there is some obstacle, such as the
man's not loving her or being bound to another woman. In any case, the
obstacle must be insurmountable, or she would not go away with me into
strange countries through great fatigue on a chimerical search."

Cantagnac had risen and, very courteously for his assumed character, had
come round the table without going near his host and the Jewess, and
entered into the other dialogue.

"Did you say you were going far, monsieur?" he inquired.

Daniels nodded and opened his arms significantly to their utmost
extent.

"Leaving Europe with a scientific design? Ah! may one hear?"

"Perhaps it would not much interest you?" returned the old man, who
seemed to feel a revival of a prejudice against the visitor upon his
coming nearer.

"The atmosphere of this house is so learned," replied, the smiling man
unabashed by the sudden coolness, "and, besides, more things interest me
than people believe, eh, madame?" directly appealing to the hostess, who
had to nod.

"You see I have a great deal of spare time since I retired from business
and I am eager to increase my store, ha, ha!"

"Well, the idea which has tormented more than one of my race, has seized
me," returned M. Daniels, "I wish to fill up gaps in our traditional
story and link our present and our future with our past. The question is
of the Lost Tribes of Israel. I believe after some research, that I know
the truth on the subject, and, more that I may be chosen to reconquer
our country. The ideal one is not sufficient for us, and I am going to
locate the real one and register the act of claiming it. Every man has
his craze or his ideal, and mine may lead me from China to Great Salt
Lake, or to the Sahara."

"What a pity," interjected Cantagnac merrily, "that the Wandering Jew
did not have your idea. It would have helped him work out his sentence
to walk around the globe!"

"He had no money to lend to monarchs sure to vanquish or to peoples
astounded by having been overcome. But his five pence have fructified by
dint of much patience, privation and economy. The Wandering Jew has
realized the legend and ceases to tramp. He has reached the goal. What
do you think about my pleasure tour?" he suddenly inquired of
Clemenceau, whose eye he caught. "Child of Europe, happy son of Japhet.
I am going to see old Shem and Ham. Have you a keepsake to send them or
a promise to make?"

"Tell them," said the host, coming over to join the group, while
Rebecca, during the continued resignation of Madame Clemenceau,
superintended the servant's removal of the luncheon service, "tell them
that we are all hard at work here and that more than ever there's a
chance of our becoming one family."

On seeing Clemenceau approach his wife, the pretended Marseillais
delicately withdrew to the corner of the sideboard where the cigar-stand
tempted him. But he kept his eyes secretly on the two men who gave him
more concern than the two women. He reflected that fate had managed
things wisely for his plans, for if Clemenceau had married the
incorruptible Jewess, he might have been more surely foiled. As for
Daniels, the amateur apostle who hinted at a union of his people, he
might be dangerous or useful. He determined to put a spy on his track,
who might smear his face with ochre and stick an eagle's feather in his
cap so that, if seen to shoot him in a New Mexican canon, that supposed
lost Tribe of Israel which include the Apaches would gain the credit of
the murder. While reflecting, his quick ear heard a light loot draw
near; he did not look round, sure that it was his new recruit who crept
up to him. It was, indeed, Madame Clemenceau, who put his half-emptied
liquor glass upon the sideboard by him.

"No heeltapi in our house, Monsieur!" she exclaimed.

Cantagnac tossed off the concentrated cordial with contempt; his head
was not one to be affected by such potations.

"Thank you! have you already opened the trenches?" he asked in an
undertone.

"By means of the Italian, yes. I have entered the stronghold."

"But he closed the door in your face!"

"No, no; I can open it at any time."

"Excellent Kisschwasser, this of yours, madame!" exclaimed Von
Sendlingen, in his satisfaction speaking the word with a little too
accurate a pronunciation to suit a native of the south of France.

"Mark that man!" whispered Rebecca to Clemenceau, whom she had rejoined
as he stood by her father. "Distrust him! his laugh is forced and false!
I am sure that he wishes you evil!"

"Then stay here and shield the house!"

"No; I must go this evening. Ah, you men of brains laugh at us women for
entertaining presentiments. But we do have them and we must utter them.
Be on your guard!"

"And must you go?" went on Clemenceau to Daniels, as if he expected to
find him less resolute than his daughter.

"More than ever!" but, seeing how he had saddened him, he took his hand
with much emotion and added: "Rebecca will explain. I go away happy to
think that the honest men outnumber the other sort and that when we all
take hold of hands, we shall see that the scoundrels excluded from our
ring will be scarcely worth disabling from farther injury."

Cesarine, perceiving that her confederate was edging gradually toward
the rifle which Antonino had been shooting with and which had been
removed from the drawing-room, where the guest for a day had too many
opportunities to be alone with it. To cover his inspection, she
suggested that Rebecca should afford the company a final pleasure, a
kind of swan's song, and went and opened the cottage-piano for her. The
Jewess did not refuse the invitation and began Gounod's "Medje" in a
voice which Von Sendlingen had room to admit had improved in tone and
volumn, and would make her as worthy of the grand opera house as it had,
five years before, of the Harmonista and its class. Daniels quietly left
the room, loth to disturb Clemenceau, whom that voice enthralled and who
became more and more deeply submerged in the thoughts it engendered. He
suffered pain from the need to liberate his sorrows, confide his spirit
and communicate his dreams. And was not this singer the very one created
to comfort him and lull him to rest? Must he remain heroic and
ridiculous in the indissoluble bond, and endure silently. On Antonino he
rested his mind and on Rebecca, the daughter of the eternally
persecuted, he longed to rest his soul.

The greatness of this man and the purity of this gifted creature were so
clearly made for one another that everybody divined and understood the
unspoken, immaterial love.

What an oversight to have let Cesarine abduct him when it was Rebecca to
whom chance had shown that he ought to belong! If he had remained free
till this second meeting, she would have been his wife, his companion
his seventh day repose, and the mother of his earthly offspring instead
of the immortal twins, genius and glory, which poorly consoled the
childless husband! As it was, the powers constituted would not allow
them to dwell near each other. She could only be the bride in the second
life--for eternity. She loved him as few women had ever loved, because
he was good, great and just--and because he was unhappy. No man existed
in her eyes superior to him. Nothing but death would set him free from
the woman who had not appreciated him properly. She had let pass the
greatest bliss a woman can know on earth--the love of a true heart and
the protection of a great intellect. If death struck them before the
wife, Felix would behold Rebecca on the threshold of the unknown land
where they would be united tor infinity. Her creed did not warrant such
a hope--his said that in heaven there were no marriages, but her heart
did not heed such sayings, and her feelings told her that thus things
would come to pass.

She had concluded the piece of music. She rose and, for the first time,
gave Cesarine her hand.

"Farewell!" she said.

"Why say it now?" answered Madame Clemenceau, surprised. "You are not
going till to-morrow morning."

"To-night! I may not see you again, we have so many preparations to
make."

"Well, as you did not come here to see me, it is of no consequence.
Farewell!"

"I am your servant, madame," said the Jewess, bowing.

"Ah, Hagar!" hissed she, "unmasked."

"Farewell, Sarah!" retorted Rebecca, stung out of her equanimity by this
sudden dart of the viper, but Cesarine said no more, and she proceeded
steadily toward the door.

Clemenceau had preceded her thither.

"What did she say?" he inquired.

"Nothing worth repeating. Beware of her as well as of that man!" but she
saw that he would not follow her glance and draw a serious inference
from the way in which the wife and the unwelcome guest had drawn closely
together. "Fulfil your destiny," she continued solemnly. "Work! remain
firm, pure and great! Be useful to mankind. Above transient things, in
the unalterable, I will await you. Do not keep me lonely too long," was
wrung from her in a doleful sob.

He could not speak, it was useless, for she knew already everything that
he night say.

"At last!" ejaculated Von Sendlingen in relief, when all had gone out,
as he sprang on the rifle and feverishly fingered it. "This is the rifle
of their latest finish. What an odd arrangement! Where the deuce is the
hammer--the trigger--and all that goes toward making up the good old
rifle of our fathers? Oh, Science, Science! what liberties are taken in
your name!" he cried in drollery too bitter not to be intended to cover
his vexation. "Mind, this rifle is included in our contract?"

"Everything," she answered in a fever, looking toward the doorway, where
her husband had disappeared with the Jewess. "Be easy! The rifle, the
cannon, the happiness, the honor and the lives of all here--myself as
well! If there is anything more you long for, say so!"

"Talk sensibly!" said he severely and gripping her wrist.